


Pebbles

by hawkqirl



Category: Daredevil (TV), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Blood, F/M, Fluff, Murder, Smut, Violence, reader is a badass, swears, unprotected sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-29
Updated: 2016-12-29
Packaged: 2018-09-13 02:00:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9101368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hawkqirl/pseuds/hawkqirl
Summary: Y/N is Matt Murdock's adoptive sister, and everyone knows that being the sister to the Devil of Hells Kitchen can bring nothing but trouble.





	

Matthew and Y/N. Y/N and Matthew.

That’s how it always was when the two of you grew up. The two of you were always together, no matter what.

You had been given to Jack Murdock when you were an infant, barely two months old, from one of his few friends that had passed away.

When Jack had brought you home, Matthew was immediately drawn to you. It was perplexing, how small and tiny and fragile you were. How helpless you were.

“What’s her name?” Matt had asked his father.

“Y/N,” Jack had answered. He looked to his son and ruffled his dark hair between his fingers. “You’re a big brother, now, Matty, so you gotta take care of her, too, alright?”

Matt had been four at the time, and even then, he had vowed that he would always protect you. He promised his father that he would watch out for you whenever you needed help, because that was what responsible older brothers were supposed to do.[[MORE]]

You were only five when Matt had had the accident. The two of you were walking down the street, his hand in yours, when some flowers had caught your young mind’s attention. As soon as you had let go of his hand, it seemed like everything went wrong.

There was the car, and then he had pushed you out of the way, and then, the next thing you knew, your brother was laying on the pavement, contaminant droplets splattered all across his face.

“Matty?” you asked him, as your voice began to shake. “Matty? Matty!” By now, you were wailing, crying out at nothing. You didn’t know what was happening. All you knew was that a group of people had started to gather around you. “Matty!”

Jack had come around, then, but that didn’t quell your tears. He scooped you up, patting your back as you gave way to your tears, and he began to focus his attention on his son, who’s hands were clutching his eyes tightly.

“Cover your eyes, Matty,” Jack had instructed, all the while you heard the sound of sirens ringing out.

And that was all.

You never could remember much of your early childhood, but you did remember the accident. You remembered it down to the last detail. There were those damn flowers; tulips, you distinctly remember. They were so beautiful, so colorful. If you hadn’t let go of Matt’s hand to look at those flowers more closely, then he probably never would’ve lost his vision.

It was your fault, even though he told you that it hadn’t been.

And then Jack died, and the two of you were taken to St Agnes Orphanage. Matt had fought for the two of you to stay together, his fierce protectiveness over you keeping you steady.

At some point, you remembered, there was an old blind man that came and visited Matt often. He would always take you and Matt out to the park, and they’d leave you at the playground while the old man talked to your brother about boring things that you didn’t care about. (Why should you care, anyway? The swings were up for grabs at the moment, nothing else mattered.)

Eventually, the old man left from the both of your guys’ lives as well, and it was just the two of you again.

Time passed, and you both grew older. When you were nine, Matt was thirteen. When you were twelve, and keeping pretty much to yourself at school, Matt was sixteen and on the cusp of graduating high school.

Matt was always smart, and he always helped you with your homework if you ever had a problem that you didn’t understand. He was able to help you the most with History, and you always wondered to yourself how was it that Matt had become so smart despite everything that had happened to the both of you.

“You’re smart, too, Y/N,” he told you when you had brought it up one day. “You’re just smart in different ways.”

You hadn’t really believed him, but it had made you happy at the idea that your brother thought that you were intelligent.

By the time you were fourteen, Matt had graduated, and he should’ve been getting on with his life.

He had planned on becoming your legal guardian, once and for all, but you knew that he couldn’t do that.

“How are you supposed to provide for us both?” you asked him.

“I’ll get a job,” he answered.

“Where would we live?” you asked him.

“Somewhere,” he replied, “Anywhere. Doesn’t matter, as long as I get you out of here.”

“Matty,” you told him in that pseudo-scolding voice. “You can’t. You can’t stop your life just for me. You have to go to college and put that brain to good use.”

“Y/N–”

“I know that dad told you that you had to always take care of me,” you said, putting a hand to his cheek. “And you have. You always have, for the past fourteen years. It’s just…” You smiled at him, even though he couldn’t see. “You should put yourself first for once. I know that you definitely deserve it.”

At first, Matt wouldn’t listen. You had told him that, at the very least, he had to apply to six colleges. If he was accepted to at least one of them, he had to go.

It wasn’t much of a surprise when Columbia University sent him an acceptance letter.

He promised to write, to call, to remain in as much contact as he possibly could. You had merely brushed it off, telling him that by the time he graduated, you’d be eighteen and ready for him to swing on by to get you.

“Love ya, Matty,” you said as you threw your arms around him the day that he was set to leave. “Don’t get a girl pregnant.”

“What did you–”

“Bye!” you chirped cheerfully as you practically shoved him into the car.

And then he, too, was gone.

Everything changed when you were fifteen. A familiar figure reappeared at the orphanage, introducing himself as “Stick”.

“That’s a weird name for an old guy,” you said while you did your homework in your room.

“Well,” he had said, turning to you, “You’re not wrong.”

He had said that now that you were older, more mature, he would be able to give you the guidance that he had once given to Matthew. You hadn’t known what he had meant at first, so you brushed it off, telling him “no thanks, I’m good”.

It wasn’t until one of your best friends was kidnapped and held hostage by her deranged lunatic older boyfriend that you decided to take him up on his offer.

And so, your training began. Stick had trained you for three years, up until you were eighteen and you had received Matt’s graduation invitation in the mail. Stick had told you that he and Matt hadn’t ended things on the best of terms, and that it would most likely irritate him to know that Stick had become your mentor in his absence. He had told you to not tell him of anything; to keep your newfound skills a secret.

“Sure,” was all you said in response as Stick left your life yet again, only for Matt to replace him.

After Matt graduated, he had gotten an internship at Landman and Zack, a law firm that paid him enough to support the two of you in your endeavors.

The first time you had met his best friend, Foggy Nelson, you had been watching TV in your and Matt’s apartment while Matt took a shower in the bathroom.

“Yeah?” you had asked as you opened the door. Your hair had still been damp from the shower that you had just taken before Matt went in, and you were wearing one of his old T-Shirts from his angsty high school days. The long-haired blond man before you didn’t say anything, instead just staring at you with his mouth gaping. “Can I help you?”

He seemed to snap out of his stupor and said, “Did it hurt?”

“What?”

“When you fell from heaven?” he asked, and you burst out with laughter because here was this random guy you didn’t even know flirting with you out of absolutely nowhere. Your laughter seemed to break him out of his second stupor, and he said, “I-I’m sorry, I didn’t know that Matt had…company.”

“Huh?” You hadn’t known what he meant for a quick second, and then it hit you. “Oh! Ew! Ew! Gross, dude!”

“What? What did I say?” he asked confusedly while you maintained a grimace on your face.

“Matty’s my brother, man!” You exclaimed, “That is disgusting!”

“Shit! I’m sorry! Oh, god, now this is awkward, and-” the man managed to get out as you heard a voice sound behind you.

“Foggy?” Matt asked, appearing from around the corner with a pair of sweats on. When he approached the door, he said, “I see you’ve met Y/N.”

Foggy looked at you with eyebrows raised. “That’s Y/N?” Matt nodded, and Foggy looked back at you. “Dude! The way you described her was like she was five years old!”

Matt snickered and said, “I told you that she was still just a kid.”

“Yeah, and that the two of you would always read little kid books together and that she always fell asleep on your lap when she was tired!” Foggy said, and now it was you who was laughing.

“Oh, god, Matty, you told him all that?” You questioned, “I haven’t done that in five years.”

“Well, that’s what I was able to tell him about when we were in college,” Matt said, a smile still on his face.

Needless to say, you and Foggy had hit it off right from the start.

While Matt and Foggy worked at Landman and Zack, you found yourself volunteering at Hell’s Kitchen’s local library. A majority of the time, you read to the children and put away the books that the kids had left lying out on the table.

There was always a little girl that you referred to as your “regular” who often brought along her baby brother to listen to you as you read. Her favorite book was this young children’s book that seemed as though she should’ve outgrown it. When you had asked her about it, once, she had just said that her dad used to read it to her every night. You assumed that her father was out of the picture.

Sometimes, though, she would drag her mother over to you as she recounted everything that you had read to her that day.

“Lisa, we have to go now,” the woman said, giving you a sympathetic look. “We shouldn’t disturb the nice woman.”

“I–I don’t mind, really,” you said, giving a nervous laugh. “She’s always one of the more enthusiastic kids. Without her, I’d probably be out of a job.”

You never learned the name of the woman, but you did catch the young girl’s name and her little brother’s name – Lisa and Frank Jr. They were sweet kids, always listening to your story telling even when it seemed like the other kids weren’t interested. It was difficult to maintain a large group of kids’ attention, especially a group of kids with varying ages, but those two always seemed so enraptured, their eyes never straying from yours as you read from the children’s book.

One time, they even gave you a thank you card for always reading to them, as though you were doing this for them, specifically. It was cute, with their illustrations and chicken scratch penmanship decorating the card.

“Thank you very much, the both of you,” you had told them as they wrapped their tiny arms around your legs.

“Thank you, Ms. Y/N!” they had said; Lisa in a more pronounced and defined diction, and her younger brother with more of a slur to his words, given his age.

After a long shift at work, you had ended up locking up at the end of the day. You began the trek back to yours and Matt’s apartment, only to suddenly be jumped and pulled into an alleyway by an unsavory character.

“Give me all of the money you got, bitch, and I’ll make this easier for ya,” the man said, his voice slurred and reeking of alcohol.

“Let me go!” you attempted to squirm out of his grasp to get away; not only for your sake, but for his, as well. Unfortunately, the man didn’t listen, instead pulling out a knife and pressing it to your throat threateningly.

“Ooh, we got a fighter here, do we?” He asked with a dark chuckle in his voice. “I like that in my women.”

“I said,” you felt your voice getting stronger, your hand gripping onto his wrist. “Let. Me. Go.” In a flash, your hand was twisting his arm back, and your other hand was grabbing onto his knife. You contorted your body so that it was facing his, and as soon as you did so, you ended up slitting his throat, blood gushing from his neck as he collapsed onto the ground.

As the life slowly drained from his body, you looked at the blade of the knife that you had just used on him, and you shut your eyes tight.

It’d been a while since you had last killed.

You slipped the weapon into your bag and set to work on ridding yourself of the body. The tricky thing about unintentionally killing someone was that, more often than not, that person had your prints all over them. You set to work on cutting off the pieces of his body that had come into contact with you, such as his arms, and part of his bulging beer belly. You tossed those spare body parts into several trash cans and eventually half dragged and half carried his dead body into an empty trash can.

At least trash day was tomorrow morning.

When you got home, you found Matt munching on some Chinese takeout while sitting at the island table.

“Matty!” you said, surprised. “You’re home early.”

“Yeah,” he said. He wasn’t wearing his glasses, and he had been growing out the slightest traces of stubble. Honestly, you dug the new kind of 'kicked puppy’ look. “I was gonna get to bed early since Foggy and I have this thing tomorrow morning.”

“Oh, yeah?” you asked him as you dropped your bag onto the floor, joining him on the stool at the island. “What kinda thing?” He handed you the other take out carton that was filled with chow mein and a slew of other meats and some chopsticks.

“Just boring lawyer stuff,” Matt said, waving it off. “Legal things that you don’t care about.”

“Ah,” you said, and a comfortable silence fell over the both of you as you ate your food. Nights were often like that with Matt, even before Jack had died. It was usually just the two of you eating dinner together, waiting for Jack to come back after a match. Matt would make you Mac and Cheese, which was your absolute favorite thing to eat while growing up, while he would make himself a sandwich, always going for the more simple things. He would make sure that you would do your homework before bed, even though you never could keep your young mind’s attention on boring things like adding and subtracting and multiplying.

Matt was a good constant for you. It was no wonder how you went off the reserves when he went away, having first killed out of necessity when you were nearly attacked at age seventeen.

By the time you finished eating, Matt had already gone to settle in for bed, which gave you ample time to clean the blood off the blade that you still had in your bag.

You quickly set to work on doing so, wiping the drying blood from the knife in the sink and running it over with water and soap. You scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed until it was clean, free of all signs of it’s previous impurities.

Deciding that it would be best to not just set down your newly acquired knife into the kitchen’s set of knives, you just slipped it back into your bag nonchalantly.

You went to bed shortly after.

One day, Matt gave you the news. “Foggy and I have decided to quit Landman and Zack.”

Your jaw had just about dropped to the floor. “What?” you had questioned, your spoon falling out of your hand and back into the bowl. “I thought you liked being a lawyer?”

“I–I do,” he said. “I do. I just think that Foggy and my talents could be put into something that we both believe in. Which is why…we’re starting our own firm.”

“Eh?” you asked. You had thought about it, imagining people coming to your brother for help with their legal woes. It was a strange picture, but you could see it being a reality. “Yeah. That sounds like it could be a good thing for you.”

“Yeah?” Matt asked, his face upturning with a small smile.

“Yes, you weirdo,” you said. “Although it doesn’t really matter what I think of it, since it’s your decision. And judging by the comment about you already quitting your job, I would say that your decision has already been made.”

True to as he had said, he and Foggy  ended up creating their own firm: Nelson and Murdock. It seemed that as soon as they had opened up for business, they had a client – a pretty, if not somewhat bedraggled, woman named Karen Page.

And then there was the talk of a vigilante on the streets of Hell’s Kitchen, dubbed the name of the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen.

You had to see him for yourself.

So, on one particular night, you outfitted yourself in a black jumpsuit and a half facial mask, spending your time on rooftops as you scoped out areas of suspicious activities.

There was next to no surprise when you saw him going up against a group of well-known mobsters from the area.

You almost immediately recognized the familiarity of the fighting style, and you were quick to take note that this “Devil” wasn’t taking lives – instead opting to just knock them out.

To you, that was inefficient and a waste. What was the purpose of letting these people with clearly no remorse whatsoever get off with just bruises and cuts and wicked headaches?

You dropped down from your place on the roof and found yourself subconsciously joining the fray, pulling out the knife that you had previously used to kill that man so many months ago. You had managed to flip one of the men onto his back, your foot pressing onto his throat, and your knife nearing closer and more closer to him.

“Wait,” the Devil said as he pulled the hand clutching the knife back. “Stop. Don’t kill him.”

That voice. That voice. You knew that voice. You’d been listening to that voice shift and change and grow deeper for the past two decades – you would’ve recognized that voice from anywhere. You could’ve recognized that voice with your eyes closed. You could’ve recognized that voice even if you hadn’t been listening.

But you had been listening, and that was your brother’s voice telling you to stop. That was your brother’s voice telling you to not kill.

That was…

“Matty,” you breathed, as confused as ever.

You couldn’t see his eyes, but you could see how his jaw went slack at discovering that 'hey, this is my sister here, and she was about to kill this guy’.

Matt punched the guy that you were still leaning over, effectively knocking him out, and then he had practically yanked you up and out of the street. He didn’t talk to you, he didn’t say a single word all the way back to your apartment.

As he removed the scarf from around his eyes, you removed the mask from yours, even though you knew that he couldn’t see you.

“What,” he said, quietly seething in anger, you could just tell, “the hell was that?”

“I should be asking you the same thing!” you told him. “I thought you were blind!”

“And I thought that you were just a normal person!” Matt countered. “How did you even…When did this…?”

You sighed, “After you went to college, Stick found me.”

As soon as he heard that name, he groaned out of frustration. “Y/N, you–”

“I turned him down, the first time,” you told him. “But then my friend was taken by this older boyfriend that she had, and I couldn’t just do nothing, so I-”

“You could’ve went to the police, Y/N!”

“Oh, like you do when you dress up as the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen?” you shot back.

“That’s different.”

“Seriously, Matty?” you asked him as though he was the biggest hypocrite in the world. “Matty, listen to yourself. You’re contradicting everything you’re saying.”

“No, I’m not, Y/N,” he said.

“Yes, you are! You were trained by Stick, so you can’t blow a fuse just because I was, too. I roughed up some bad guys and you can’t scold me for that, because you do the same exact thing,” you told him.

He seemed to take in what you had just told him. It was true, though, no matter what he said. You were just doing the same exact thing that he was, only you were willing to take it a step further. “You shouldn’t be doing any of this,” Matt finally said in a quiet voice. “Dad told me that I had to protect you. That I had to always protect you.”

And that’s when you realized what this all meant to him. He had been entrusted as your keeper since the day you came into the Murdock family, and since then, he’d been trying to make right on that promise that he had made with Jack, back when be was still alive.

“Matty,” you said softly. “Matty, you can’t protect me forever. You know that, don’t you?”

Your brother gave a small nod. “I just…didn’t want this kind of life for you. I wanted to keep you as far from this as I possibly could.”

You scoffed, touching a scrape on the side of his head. “Like I wouldn’t notice wounds like these?” you asked him and he gave you a sad smile that broke your heart into little pieces. “I’m sorry, Matty.”

His voice was small as he said, “I’m sorry, too.”

The both of your relationship was a bit rocky after that; rough around the edges and still trying to find a way to fix itself.

Eventually, though, you found him asking you to be his back up on his missions to stop the organized mobs from destroying the city from the inside out. At first, you were surprised.

But you weren’t saying no to that.

The two of you fought side by side, taking down whoever you could whenever you could. You were a significant assist to him in his endeavors, even though there were the occasional setbacks.

The rumors of the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen and his Midnight Mistress scattered all throughout the city, and although you despised the name that they called you (his Midnight Mistress? Not only was that absolutely repulsive, considering he was your brother, it was also offensive. Why the hell were you his mistress in the first place? Honestly, the media just kept making things up), you were glad that recognition was being given, even though this recognition wasn’t always good.

People did seem to approve of your brother’s methods of not killing, and they actually seemed to be rooting for him by the time that the two of you had put down the big bad kingpin himself, Wilson Fisk.

You didn’t entirely understand why, though, considering that Fisk could and would get out eventually, and he’d most likely pick up his old habits and find the two of you and destroy everything that you held dear.

But that wasn’t on people’s minds.

Crime in Hell’s Kitchen was in no way gone now that Fisk was out of the picture, although people had started to relax more about it all. You even still enjoyed your job at the library, although little Lisa and her little brother Frank didn’t come by anymore. You had written them off as having moved away, and you moved on with life, just as Matt did with his.

Nelson and Murdock had garnered more attention than it had ever before, however the firm itself was as broke as one could imagine. You had tried to tell Matt that he should actually charge people with money if he wanted to make some actual income from what they did, but he just told you that it was better to build up a database of clients so that other clients would come.

“Yeah, okay,” you told him. “Hopefully those clients will pay, though.”

He didn’t seem to care, though.

The four of you – Karen, Foggy, Matt and you – had all been having a night out at Josie’s when they came across a potential client in an Irish man named Grotto who had claimed to have been apart of a mass homocide that he was just able to narrowly escape. Everything about the case reeked of something sinister, of something bad, but it wasn’t your choice to make as to whether they would accept him as their client or not.

They did.

You went with Karen to the Hospital with Grotto, giving the excuse to Metro-General that you were his cousin and had grown up with him in Queens after your parents had died a tragic death in a fire.

They bought it.

You sat on the chair that was beside Karen, staring at the resting Irish man before you.

“You think he’s worth saving?” You asked her, breaking the quiet silence that had grown over the two of you.

“Huh?” Karen asked and you nodded over to Grotto. “Oh. I mean…” She shifted in her seat, “I suppose so. If he wants to start off fresh, then how can I be against that?”

“Hm,” you thought quietly to yourself. You didn’t exactly know if he was worth saving or not, but you knew one thing for certain: he wasn’t worth dying for. If the group that did this were to make another appearance, you would most definitely not have to think twice about giving him up.

You knew that Matt would disagree, wanting him to be protected no matter what.

And that was where the two of you differed. You believed in eliminating the problem before that problem grew bigger, while Matt was all about the “give them another chance” thing. It’s not that they didn’t deserve a second chance, they probably did. It’s just that you knew human nature, and you knew that people don’t change. Not really. So even if they claimed that they wanted a second chance, or a third chance, or a fourth or a fifth chance, they would always resort back to their devious ways.

It was better, you thought, to get rid of them for good, than to let them go out and make the same mistakes and crimes over and over and over again.

With Wilson Fisk, you were seconds away from killing him; your finger already on the trigger and pointed directly at him. But still, Matt had stopped you.

It was his usual choir boy routine. He’d always been more into the whole good little Catholic kid thing than you had been.

“I’m gonna go get something from the vending machine,” you announced, standing up from the chair you had sat at. “You want anything?”

“No, I’m good,” Karen said, giving you a small smile. “Thank you, though.”

You dismissed yourself from the hospital room and found yourself going down the corridors in search of that vending machine that you saw on the way to the room. Once you approached it, you dug around in your pocket for three-fifty, which could buy you that bag of chips that you’d been eyeing.

That was when you heard the sound of feet running and people rushing all around you.

“He’s got a gun,” you heard a nurse say to a com in a semi-panicked voice, “I repeat, armed male. Shots fired.”

You felt your adrenaline suddenly spike. You’d always gotten a rush from a mission, no matter how dangerous. And in this situation, with all of these helpless people at risk?

You calmly slipped the bag of chips into your bag and began to walk down the different corridors until you heard gunfire.

He couldn’t see you, but you could see him.

He was trained, military type. The swagger in his walk clearly indicated that he had been trained. A military-issued gun was in his grasp, his hand on the trigger as he fired suddenly through a glass window, narrowly missing two people that you made out to be Karen and Grotto.

Karen and Grotto!

You had forgotten all about them in the midst of your occurrences; you hadn’t even given them a second thought. But now that you remembered them, again, you were taking off in the direction of the nearest exit.

You were on the streets in five minutes, flat, your mind racing with a slew of thoughts. One part of you was telling yourself to join the fight, find this guy and take him down, but then the sensible, good little sister part of you was telling you to call Matt.

You decided to be the good little sister. You pulled your phone from your bag, dialing his number as quickly as you possibly could as a car sped past you, with a bullet hitting up against the side view mirror.

As Matt didn’t pick up, you came with a choice: you could march upstairs to the roof, where that last bullet had previously been shot from, or you could leave; go home and not cause any worry to Karen, who had more or less left you at the Hospital – not that it was her fault.

You decided to go home.

The next morning, you were woken up from your sleep by a loud rapping on your door. Matt hadn’t come home the night before, so you had figured that something had happened, but he had it under control.

When you opened the door, you learned that he did not have it under control; he absolutely did not have it under control.

Foggy came, dragging your brother in through the door. He was still wearing his costume, minus the mask, and he was unconscious.

“What happened?” you asked his blond haired friend, who only shrugged.

“I found him like this on a rooftop!” Foggy exclaimed as you both dragged him onto the couch. “He could’ve been like this all night, Y/N!”

Shit, shit, shit. If you didn’t do something, and fast, you’d probably end up having some type of a panic attack.

“Okay, I need warm water and a towel, Foggy,” you instructed him as you began to strip Matt of his Daredevil outfit. Foggy didn’t move for a moment, instead just staring at you as you peeled off the layers from your brother’s body. “Now!”

He got the message and immediately flew into work mode: pulling out a large bowl from the kitchen and filling it up with warm water from the sink. He pulled a towel off of a shelf and presented the items to you.

By now, you’d gotten him down to his boxers, and you set to work on cleaning the blood from his skin. First you started with his head – “Oh my god,” you commented as Foggy looked at you worriedly.

“What?” he asked, and you pointed at the area on his temple.

“He got shot in the head,” you breathed.

“What?” Foggy questioned, his voice getting higher.

You gingerly touched the area surrounding the wound. You knew that if the bullet had found it’s mark a few centimeters from where it had, Matt would be dead by now, for certain. “It was a warning shot,” you explained to Foggy. “He wanted Matt to back off, but he didn’t wanna kill him.”

What sort of a person were you dealing with, then? Someone who killed the Mexican Cartel, and both the Dogs of Hell and the Irish mob, but didn’t kill your brother, the vigilante?

Your mind filled with thoughts of what sort of a person he was as you helped your brother as best you could. By the time you had finished, the bowl and the towel and the water were all a diluted red color, made that way by the blood of the only family you had to call your own.

“Smelling salts, third drawer on your left,” you told Foggy as you looked at Matt’s unconscious body, eyes closed and body unmoving as though he were dead.

You didn’t even want to ever consider the possibility of that happening.

Foggy returned to you with the smelling salts that you had come to own after Stick instructed you to always keep them on hand, and you placed them underneath Matt’s nose. The two of you waited, and then waited a bit longer, and then, his eyes shot open.

“Matty!” you practically pounced on him, your arms wrapping around his the second he sucked in a breath.

Matt groaned and looked to you, patting your hair softly, gently. “Foggy, could you get me some aspirin?” he asked in a gravelly tone of voice, not at all sounding as he usually did. His friend complied, fetching him both a glass of water an some of the pills. Matt downed the pills and the water while you held onto him, relieved that he was alright.

Foggy, though, wasn’t as pleased. Before you knew it, they were arguing and Foggy was threatening to take Matt’s costume from him.

The air was tense as Foggy left, leaving you alone with Matt, who slumped down onto a chair in a fatigued-like manner.

“He’s kind of right, Matty,” you said, putting your own two cents into the mix. “You need to be careful and rest. If something bad happened to you, I…”

Matt knew what you were trying to get across to him, and he nodded, giving you another sad smile. “I’m sorry, Y/N. I didn’t mean to worry you like that.”

“It’s not just that, Matty,” you huffed, sitting across from him on the couch he’d been laying on. “If you were…gone, and I was alone, I don’t think that I would be able to bear it.”

“You’d be fine, eventually, Y/N,” he said. “This life we live, it…it doesn’t have all of the guarantees of a normal life, you know that.”

“But that doesn’t mean that you need to die a martyr, Matty,” you told him and stood up, kissing the top of his head as you went into your room.

You heard a crash in the afternoon, followed by loud screaming. Thinking that something had just gone horribly, terribly wrong and something or somebody was attacking your brother, you ran out of your room to find him up against the wall, screaming and banging up against the wall in a panicked manner.

“Matty!” you said, rushing over to him. “Matty!” You reached out and touched his fingers, and then his cheek, which seemed to quell the screams but not the tremors that were wracking through his body. “Matty! What’s wrong?”

“Can’t…” He said softly, almost as though he was afraid to use his own voice. “Can’t hear.”

You gasped quietly, one of your hands flying to cover your mouth. He couldn’t…hear? He couldn’t see, and he couldn’t hear?

“Matty,” you said gently, wrapping your arms around him tightly. “Oh, Matty.”

It was like he was in complete and total darkness, unaware of everything around him. He couldn’t see you, he couldn’t hear you, but he could feel you and your touch as you held onto him closely, rocking him in your arms ever so slightly.

“Matty,” you mumbled as you just hugged him while he clutched onto you, the only piece of familiarity in this darkened world.

Before you knew it, the both of you had gone to sleep.

Matt woke up first, shifting in his place on the wall. His movement caused you to stir, bringing you out of dreamland and back into reality.

He snapped his fingers together lightly as you mumbled, “Wha…?”

“Someone’s at the door,” Matt said as you heard knocking that had clearly come from the front door.

“You can-?” you began, and he nodded as he stood upright onto his feet.

A wave of relief flushed through you, and you slumped further against the wall – that is, until you heard the voice of Karen Page at the door, also known as Matt’s current crush of the year.

That was your cue to leave.

After Karen had left, you popped your head back into the main room and saw that Matt was grabbing his jacket.

“Where’re you going?” you questioned of him, “You’re supposed to be resting, need I remind you?”

“Come with me if you want,” Matt said, pulling on the hoodie. “I’m gonna go see Melvin, first, and then I’m gonna try and find out who this 'Punisher’ guy is.”

You sighed. There wasn’t much that you could do; once Matt Murdock set his mind on something, he pursued it until it’s conclusion. And  
at this moment, this new vigilante was his current obsession.

“Okay, okay,” you grumbled, “Lemme just get changed.”

The two of you were at Melvin’s place in absolutely no time at all. When Melvin got a look at the absolutely shit condition Matt’s mask was in, he had been hesitant to agree to fix it. Of course, Matt just turned on his usual Murdock charm (which wasn’t the only similarities that he had to his father), and within moments, Melvin was agreeing to make him an entirely new one.

Only Matt could do that.

Matt had given Melvin the task of fixing up his current mask as best as he possibly could for tonight, and as soon as he mentioned going out to so his vigilante stuff tonight, you wanted to smack him.

As the two of you waited, you hissed at him, “Matty, you are not ready.”

“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “We just need to keep the Punisher off the streets – that’s more important.”

“Do you ever even listen to half the things that come out of your mouth?” you asked him incredulously. “It’s not worth dying over! We can do this any other day; tomorrow, even!”

“No,” he shook his head. “Strike it while it’s hot. That crime scene with the Irish mob is still open, but it might not be tomorrow. And then there’s the thing with Grotto tonight, too.” You heaved a sigh and Matt placed his hand in yours. “I’m sorry, Y/N, but we have to do this.”

“No, I get why we have to do it,” you told him. “I just…”

You didn’t even know what you wanted to say, so you just closed your mouth. Nothing you said would affect his decisions. You’d known that since you were still just a kid, coining a term for his behavior.

“Matty never changes,” you mumbled to yourself, obviously not too quiet for him to hear, but quiet nonetheless.

After Matt got his semi-repaired mask back, you both tracked down the Punisher’s place of living with the help of Matt’s senses that rivaled a bloodhounds’.

When you both discovered that this Punisher knew about the plan with Grotto, the two of you knew what you had to do.

Before you could even think twice, you guys were suiting up, collecting your non-fatal weapons and concealing them as you made your way to where the Grotto-Brass transaction was set to go down.

Matt told you that this Punisher guy would stick close to rooftops, most likely, so the two of you, thanks to your urges to stay together, eventually located him.

Matt raised a finger to his lips, giving you the universal signal to be quiet as he dropped a can of tear gas in the Punisher’s general vicinity.

The moment he noticed the smoke arising from the can, he was on the move, with you and Matt following him.

Fighting ensued, with water pouring into your eyes and drenching your kevlar suit as you and Matt both exchanged blows with the trained military man. There came a point where the man grabbed hold of you and the both of you fell down a glass sky light, everything in your mind fading to black upon impact with the ground.

The next thing you know, the very next thing, is you’re slipping back into consciousness as soon as you hear a thud beside you. You open your eyes only to find that your mask is no longer covering your face, as it had been before, but instead placed beside you on the ground.

Chains are wrapped around you, and next to you is your unconscious brother, with his mask still on.

Your eyes shot up to the figure before you, and for the first time in all of the two other times that you’ve seen this man, now was the first time that you really saw him, full on. He was tall, wearing a practical outfit that was probably very easy to move around in. He had a short haircut, which was most likely pointing to the obvious military history that he had.

Needless to say, he was attractive, despite having both you and Matt chained to a chimney.

His darkened eyes seemed to stare into your very soul as you questioned calmly, “What is this?”

The man just continued to look at you, and for a moment you wondered if he was possibly a mute of some kind. And then he said, “You’re different from your partner, I gotta say.”

He tore his eyes away from you as he moved to the corner to do something with…were those weapons?

“Why did you take off my mask and not his?” you asked curiously.

The man sighed and simply said, “You fell head first.”

You understood what he had meant by that. If you truly had fallen head first, you might’ve had a concussion, or cranial swelling. It was a good move to remove your helmet, but why would he do that in the first place? Wasn’t he supposed to be the bad guy here?

“What you’re doing,” you began, “You’re taking out corrupt people, aren’t you?”

He didn’t say anything, instead settling for glancing up at you slightly.

You took that as your cue to continue. “You take them down, make sure they don’t get to run the streets anymore.”

“What, you gonna tell me to stop doin’ what I do, like your boyfriend did?” he asked, and you scoffed.

“Daredevil’s not my boyfriend,” you said. “And I don’t exactly disagree with your methods.” He merely cocked an eyebrow and you proceeded to explain what you meant. “You’re making sure that there’re less crime lords, mob bosses, and corrupt people in Hell’s Kitchen, and you’re making sure that they never make a reappearance. It’s justice, and I see why you feel that you have to do it.”

“Really,” he commented. “You’re Red’s partner, and you don’t mind the killing I do?”

You shook your head, “Not like I haven’t done it in the name of justice before.”

He seemed shell-shocked, to say the least. He meandered back towards you and crouched in front of you, searching your eyes for the truth, only to find that it was already there.

“I haven’t killed as of late out of consideration for him,” you said. “He may be hell bent on taking you down, but…I don’t think you’re evil, or psychotic. You’re just so exceedingly intelligent that people don’t recognize the brightness. That’s all.”

“And if I were to kill Grotto?” he asked you.

“He wouldn’t agree with me,” you nodded in Matt’s direction, “But I wouldn’t be against it. The way I see it, is that you do what you gotta do to make the world a better place. If your methods work, then what’s the real issue?”

“Hm,” he commented quietly as he continued to study your face. You didn’t know what he was looking for. “Interesting.”

Interesting? What the hell did that even mean?

You watched as he wandered back over to his arsenal of weapons, pulling out a gun that you determined was a .357. You knew that he wasn’t going to be threatening you – it wasn’t in his “Punisher code”, so you were able to relax as he came up on the other side of Matt and placed the gun into your brother’s hand. He circled duct tape all around it, securing it firmly in his grasp. When he had finished, he sat upright with a huff, rising to his feet.

“What’s your name?” you asked him in an attempt to make small talk.

At first he didn’t answer you, instead focusing his attention on concealing weapons somewhere inside of his clothing. And then, ever so quietly, you heard him say it: “Frank.”

Maybe you should’ve been scared out of your mind, but you just weren’t. You didn’t feel threatened by this guy. You didn’t feel like you would come into harms way. It just seemed like he wouldn’t do that. Why you felt as such, though, didn’t make much sense, considering this guy’s track record.

He disappeared around the corner for a long while, out of your line of vision. He must’ve left somewhere, you figured, as he hadn’t made a reappearance in five minutes and you no longer heard any sounds from him.

He had returned by the time Matt woke up. They talked as you stared at Frank in quiet curiosity. There was a type of intensity, a type of fire that was sparked in between their conversation, and before you knew it, there was Grotto, in front of you both and recounting the time when he had killed a man as a hit and killed an old lady just because she was there.

You could tell that Matt’s resolve of trying to save Grotto was lessening, but he continued to argue with Frank, even as the latter began to count down.

Suddenly, a gunshot rang out and you felt the chains that were wrapped around you both loosen, falling down onto your lap as you saw Frank shoot directly at Grotto’s chest.

Matt was on Frank in a second, throwing punches like no tomorrow while you flew to Grotto’s side.

“Oh, god, I’m dying,” he muttered as he clutched onto his arm.

“It’s okay,” you told him. “It’s okay.”

Grotto already knew that he was dying, there was no point in trying to give him false hope that he’d make it out unscathed. The best that you could do was try and give him a peaceful passing.

Matt came towards the both of you and attempted to carry him, even though you knew it was futile. Grotto simply told him to put him down, and Matt complied with his request.

You looked back to Frank, to find that he was training his gun on something below you all. Matt noticed this as well, and he gripped the chain that he had tightly in his grasp and flung it at Frank.

But it was too little, too late, for Frank had already fired, creating a loud explosion from the ground.

Everything happened so quickly as Matt knocked him out, nearly dragging him by the neck. He hoisted Frank’s unconscious body up onto his shoulders as he told you to get going down the stairs.

You grabbed your mask and placed it back onto your face, concealing your identity yet again as you raced down the stair steps as quickly as you could.

Matt placed Frank into the elevator, and the two of you were just about to go down, until you saw an old man come out of his room.

You knew your brother, and you knew that he wouldn’t let it go, so you followed him as he practically ran outside of the elevator, pulling one of the first few Dogs of Hell into his arms as hostage. He trained the gun, which was still in his hands from earlier on, onto the Dog of Hell’s temple, telling the old man to get back into his apartment.

Once the old man was out of the way, that meant free rein on the biker gang.

Both you and Matt fought side by side, you taking their bats and striking them against their heads with the wooden sticks. The amount of people seemed to just continue on and on and on, and it seemed like hours had gone by by the time all of the Dogs of Hell were knocked out.

Matt walked over to the elevator and said, “Frank’s gone.”

Unbeknownst to even yourself, you let out a sigh of some sort of relief.

Over the course of the next few days, Matt broke the news of Grotto’s death to Karen as Foggy, and had been preparing his funeral with their help.

You didn’t want to join in with them, instead going to work as you usually did.

Work in the library went on as usual, and you continued to read to the children. When you thought about it, it was strange how you were this seemingly kind hearted person when, during the night hours, you were someone else entirely. No one would’ve ever believed that you were the person that you were.

One day, you were reading to the children at your usual time, the afternoon hours. Since it was after lunch, the kids were more wide awake and paying attention than the morning session kids had been.

You had just finished reading the book when your eyes flashed up to see a familiar face.

It was Frank, standing behind all of the kids and the other parents that had come by to listen along with their children. He just stared at you, looking as you said your closing statements that wrapped up story time. Once you had finished, the children dispersed about you, scattering this way and that to other sections of the library with their weary parents following closely after them.

Still, he stood there, not moving.

He was waiting for you.

“Can I help you, sir?” you asked him.

He faltered for a quick moment before he said, “No, ma'am.” He just stared at you, and then pointed to the book that you had just been reading. “That book.”

“Huh?” you asked and glanced down at the friendly drawn bear on the front cover. “What, this?” He nodded and you wondered why he was inquiring about it. “This one was a favorite of one of the kids who used to come by here. It’s–”

“One batch, two batch,” he said softly, his eyes not tearing away from the book for a second. “Penny–”

“–And dime,” you finished. “You know it?” You were surprised, mostly. You hadn’t expected someone like him to know a preschool kids’ book.

“Once,” he said, his voice low. He seemed to be thinking of something to himself, lost in his thoughts while you just looked at him.

He was troubled, you could just tell by that look on his face. He’d lost someone. Someone special to him.

“Is…is that why you do what you do?” you asked him suddenly, breaking him out of his thoughts. “For whoever you lost?”

He didn’t say anything, but he did give you the smallest of nods.

“You need any help with that?” you suddenly asked, and his gaze met your eyes.

“You serious?” he asked you, and you shrugged.

“Everyone needs help, sometimes,” you told him.

He scoffed, “Yeah? I don’t think that’s gonna fly by Red.”

Would this hurt Matt? Yes. You already knew that. But if you saw a person in need of help, you wouldn’t just stand down. “What he doesn’t know won’t kill him. Besides, it’s not like he owns me. If I wanna help take down the people that are making my city shitty, I will.”

And that was how you and Frank came to be fighting together.

It was rocky, at first, you weren’t afraid to admit. You and Frank had differing fighting styles, and the two of you had to find a balance in between all of that.

When you did, though, it became something amazing.

You would locate the bad guys, most of the time, and then the two of you would take them down, side by side. You were more used to fighting in hand to hand combat, with the occasional use of a sword or a knife. Frank, though, was automatically more comfortable with a gun.

“Hold it like this,” he would instruct you, touching you ever so lightly so that you would position it correctly in your arms. “Keep it steady. Eye on the target. Exhale as you shoot.”

Whenever something went right during target practice, he’d always give you praises that made your stomach flutter with the sensation of butterflies.

“You’re doin’ good, sweetheart,” he’d tell you. “But you gotta remember to be open on all sides.”

“I’ve got it, I’ve got it,” you would tell him.

“Oh, really, now?” he would ask as he took you out to play Lazer Tag one day.

“What is this?” you asked him.

“You said that you could handle it,” he said as the two of you suited up with your vests. “I say you prove it.”

“Really?” you questioned flatly. The last time you’d played Lazer Tag was with your friends from High School, and you just remembered getting frustrated at the fact that everyone kept shooting at you.

“Really,” he replied as he pushed you in to the darkened room gently.

When the game started, you immediately went for a hiding spot. You found yourself climbing onto the decorations and staying on top of them, close to the ceiling. As people scampered by and screams of glee were heard, you trained your gun on them and fired, taking out several before feeling the need to change your location once again.

You hopped from the top of one decoration to another, laying flat on the surface as you fired several more rounds. You were so absorbed in watching the kids question 'where’d that shot come from?’ And 'who shot me?’ that you didn’t even notice when Frank had snuck up behind you.

“Bang,” he said as he fired a shot onto your vest, causing it to vibrate and turn off momentarily.

“Hey!” You had called out. Before you could even follow him and call him out on it (that counted as cheating, right?), he had disappeared out of sight, leaving you as bewildered as ever.

By the time the game had finished, you couldn’t find him, even still. When the two of you got your scores back, you had had 202 “kills”, with 94% shooting accuracy and 1 “death”.

Frank, however, was an entirely different situation. He had had 436 “kills”, with 98% shooting accuracy, and 0 deaths.

“What the hell?” you asked him as the two of you sat down into a booth across from him. “How can you have four hundred and thirty six kills in twelve minutes? And a ninety eight percent shooting accuracy? How is that even possible?”

He chuckled as a waitress took the both of your orders, and said, “It’s like I told you. You gotta be open on all sides. You can’t think that you’re safe just because you’re hidden.” He took a swig of his coffee, “That’s how they get you.” He gestured to you, “That’s how I got you.”

“That wasn’t fair, though,” you pouted. “You disappeared and had an advantage since you’re already a deadshot.”

“That just shows that you’ve still got a lot to learn, sweetheart,” Frank said as your heart fluttered once again inside of your chest. “Don’t worry, I’ll help you with all that shit later.”

The nice thing about Frank was that after an intense training session, he always walked you home – or, at least, a block away from your home.

“It was nice, Frank,” you told him. “Even though you cheated.”

“Even though I cheated,” he repeated, a small smile on his lips. You realized, then, under the dim lighting of the lamp post beside you both, that you liked that smile of his. It was better than his scowl, anyway. “Night, Y/N.”

“Goodnight, Frank,” you would tell him as the both of your eyes lingered on one another’s a bit too long before you turned away, walking off towards your Matt’s apartment. Sometimes, if you were to look back behind you, you’d find him there, still.

Frank had introduced you to this underground gym that he used on his downtime, telling you that it belonged to “a friend”. You decided not to question it, and instead, followed his lead as you both came to train with one another. The two of you practiced fighting with each other, first, with you occasionally winning, or with him occasionally wining. Usually, though, you both came to a sort of a stand still – the both of you panting exhaustedly against the exercise mats.

On one of these days, you both had managed to swing blows to one another easily. You had ended up using your agility to evade his punches and dodge his throws, while he used his sheer strength to overpower your fists or to jump over your sweeping kicks.

At some point, though, you had managed to pin him down underneath your body, your arm pressing down onto his throat. “I win,” you grinned.

He, though, was having none of that. He flipped you onto your back, hovering over your body as he said, “Don’t think so, sweetheart.” You panted, glaring up at him as he said, “So when one of those douches got you pinned down like this, what can you do to get out?”

You certainly knew one way that you could get out of this, but you didn’t exactly think that it would fly.

By now you were a panting, sweaty, heated up mess and Frank was no better. Your brain was turning into mush the longer you waited, and you just decided 'fuck it’.

You leaned up, pressing your lips against his, catching him completely off guard; just in time for you to flip him over to be on his back. You broke away from the kiss to say, leaning in closely to his face, “I win.”

Frank scoffed as you stood up, getting up on your feet with slightly wobbly legs. Your heart was beating loudly in your ears, almost like an incessant drum. “That’s a dirty move, Y/N, and you know it.”

“Yeah?” you asked as you raised your bottle of water to your lips, downing some of the liquid. “Well, I got out of the situation, didn’t I?”

“Seems so,” he said as he rose to his feet. He came up from behind you and gently touched your back. “I wasn’t finished, though.”

What?, you questioned to yourself, What did he just say?. He turned you around so that he could face you, and then he pressed his lips against yours, kissing you gently and softly, almost hesitantly, like he was unsure of himself.

It was the weirdest thing ever, because he just felt so right; the way he moved his lips against yours was right, the way his eyes fluttered shut as he kissed you was right, the way he placed a hand ever so slightly on your hip was right.

It was weird. You’d never felt like that about anyone else before.

You wrapped your arms around his neck and pulled him in closer to you as you parted your lips against his, opening your mouth for him to explore. He accepted your invitation readily, wrapping both of his arms around you, now, as you continued to hold onto him tightly.

The kisses were warm, and heated, and quickly turned sultry as he moved his lips down to nip at your neck, causing the smallest of breathless moans to rupture from your mouth. He kissed all across your neck, spending specific time on certain areas where he bit at your skin in an almost greedy-like fashion.

“Frank–” you panted breathlessly as he brought his kisses up from your neck to your jawline, and then back up to your lips. When the two of you finally parted, with you a mess in front of him, all you could do was look at him as you tried to regain your composure, which had went out the window the moment you had pinned him down onto the mat.

“Sorry,” Frank immediately said, tearing his eyes away from you as he went back to his corner, lifting up his bottle of water and taking large gulps of the beverage.

“There’s nothing to be sorry for,” you told him, your voice sounding stronger than it had only a few moments ago. You stepped up towards him, and said, “Don’t know about you, but…I’ve had a bit of a crush on you for a while, now.”

He turned, looking directly at you. “Yeah?”

“Mhm,” you told him, suddenly gaining a boost in confidence as you realized that he probably wanted you just as much as you wanted him. “How 'bout you?”

Frank let out a small chuckle, and shook his head slightly. “Since that time we made eye contact on the roof?” He had phrased it more like a question than a statement, but you knew him. He didn’t seem like the type for mushy confessions – this was probably as best as you’d get.

Not that you were complaining.

“Yeah?” you asked him this time as your eyes dropped from his eyes to his lips.

“Mhm,” he commented, and the two of you just stared at each other, lost and wrapped up in one another’s ambiance.

And then, like a trance had been broken, the two of you were pressed up against one another, lips practically attacking each other as he slipped your loose tank top up and over your head, flinging it off somewhere. You pulled off his shirt, riding him of the material, and before you connected your lips back to his, you shamelessly traced a hand up alongside the muscle he had on his built torso; the muscles rippling across his skin.

He looked fucking delicious.

You had lifted your face up to bring him in to another toe-curling kiss as he made quick work to remove your sports bra from your body, depositing the fabric elsewhere as his lips practically flew to sucking onto your freed breasts. Your legs felt like jelly as his tongue sucked on and laved over your nipples, forming them into hardened peaks and making them sensitive to his touch as he tweaked them with his fingers.

Another moan was emitted from your lips as he kissed all around your chest, and then moved back up to capture your lips yet again. He pulled you in even closer to him as he tapped your legs gently with his fingers, nonverbally urging you to hop up onto him.

You obliged, holding tightly onto him as you wrapped your legs around his hips, bringing your center smack dab against the hardened member that was concealed through his pants. You pressed kisses up and down the side of his face, your lips coming into contact with the stubbly surface as you landed kisses against his neck. Frank moved the both of you until you were both lying down onto the mats, you underneath him.

The two of you separated from the kiss, only for him to question, “Do you want this?”

It seemed like a no-brainer question, obviously, but you equated his question as being something else, as though he were asking 'do you want me?’. Your heart broke at the thought. Here was this broken man, who thought he’d never be loved or feel love ever again, and then here you were.

He wanted to know if you still wanted him, despite it all. In spite of it all. He wanted to know if you wanted him, the Frank Castle that was before you now.

Your answer, then, was as much of a no-brainer as his question was. “Yes.”

You could’ve sworn that you saw the faintest traces of a smile cross his lips as he leaned down, pressing his lips back to yours as one of his hands squeezed tightly onto your breast, kneading your mounds with his fingers. He broke away from the kiss to get you out of your gym shorts, sliding them down and over your shapely legs and tossing them out of the way as he continued to bring his head down against your neck, kissing your skin while  pleasurable sighs fell from your mouth. You wrapped your arms around the back of his neck as he kissed all across your chest, dipping down to suck on your nipples with his warm tongue.

He brought the kisses lower and lower and lower, until he was kissing down your thighs and calves, and moving back up on your next leg. Sometimes, just to tease you, he’d get close to kissing the inside of your thighs, making you squirm in anticipation, only for him to move away, spreading his kisses further away from the place you wanted – no, needed – him most.

“Frank,” you groaned, frustrated and in desperate need of his touch.

Those dark eyes flashed up to look at yours as he questioned, “Yeah?”

“I…” You were hesitant to say it, although you didn’t know why, exactly. Maybe it was partly because of the fact that this was your first time with him, and you didn’t exactly know what to expect. You didn’t know if he liked you being vocal, or if he preferred it quiet. You didn’t know anything at all concerning his preferences, really.

“Speak up for me, baby girl,” Frank said, and you felt heat rush through your body at hearing what he had just called you. He nipped at a spot close to the inside of your thighs, and you felt your heartbeat quicken.

“I need you,” you said, your voice quiet, small. Braving a look down at him, you saw that he was wearing a downright sinful smirk across his face.

“Yeah?” He asked again, and something inside you told yourself to kick him, straight in that face of his, but you reined yourself in. No need to get murderous on an ally.

“Please,” you groaned, and that seemed to do the trick.

He pulled down your panties off of you at an achingly slow rate, revealing yourself entirely to him. He spread your legs open and began to kiss, bite, nip, and suck on the insides of your thighs, making tingles and shivers go all throughout your body. Finally, he pulled away, looking at you, just studying your face.

“Listen up,” he said, “You don’t like something, you tell me, alright?”

You nodded, feeling flushed with best as he gazed at you so intently.  
“And if I do like it?”

That wicked grin made another reappearance on his face as he said, “Then you scream for me.”

Barely a second after he said that, he brought his head down to the space between your legs, licking a long stripe up your pussy lips and stopping at the top. He parted the lips, and in a few seconds that felt like an eternity later, you felt the tingling sensation of his tongue on your clit, encircling the bud carefully and slowly as you made a sound that was somewhere between a sigh and a moan.

“Mmmm,” you huffed breathlessly as he continued to lap up at your heat, dragging his tongue down to slightly dip down into your center, only to make long strides back up towards your clit.

He continued to lick at you for a few good minutes before he gradually picked up the pace, raising your hips slightly as he threw your legs over his shoulders, allowing him better access to eat you out.

His tongue worked it’s magic as he sucked onto your clit all the while his hands were rubbing light circles into you lower stomach, making butterflies appear in your belly. You felt warmth flood through your body as he diligently continued to focus his attention on the little nub of nerves at the top of your pussy, devouring you in a way that made you feel closer and closer to the edge.

He snuck a hand down to your center, inserting a finger into your wet heat that made you moan loudly and Buck your hips upward.

“Fuck, Frank!” you groaned as he moved the finger inside and outside of you at a steadily and rapidly increasing pace. “Fuck!”

He kept right on sucking onto your clit as he inserted another finger inside of you, stretching you with his digits. He curled his fingers inside of you as he sought out that one particular spot, and – shit! – the moment he found it, you were moaning and groaning loudly as he struck that spot again and again with his fingers.

He felt so good – the way his tongue was flicking your clit this way and that and the way his fingers moved back and forth inside of you, filling you and stretching you in a way that made the knot tighten even more significantly inside of you.

“Frank,” you whined, your hips raising off the mat as you wanted more – no, you needed more. “Frank, I’m gonna cum.”

His tongue seemed to begin moving at an even faster pace as you uttered those words. You felt his fingers begin to hit up against your g-spot each time as you came closer and closer to giving in entirely.

“Fuck, Frank, I’m gonna cum, I’m gonna cum,” you repeated as he continued his ministrations, spurring you on, wanting you to fall apart before him, because of him. “Frank, I’m gonna cum, I’m gonna cum, Frank, Frank…” And then he hit that one spot again, and you felt it all crumble down as your raised hips fell down to the mat. “Fuck!” you shouted as you felt wave after wave of your orgasm hit you, making you absolutely weak in the knees as rounds of pleasure wracked through your body.

Frank slowly stopped stimulating you as you came down from your high, withdrawing both his face and his fingers from your sensitive sex. He couldn’t even get a word out before you were practically tackling him, pinning him back down to the mat as you kissed him deeply, inserting your tongue into his mouth from the get-go. You tasted yourself on his tongue, and for some reason, that just made you get all the more heated.

His large hands cupped your ass, grinding you down onto the stiffness in his pants and making the smallest of moans fall from his lips.

You broke away from the kiss, smirking in a mischievous fashion, as you slid down his body slowly.

“What are you…?” he began as you tugged both his pants and his boxers down in one swift movement, causing his hardened member to spring upward toward his stomach, now that it was free from it’s confines.

You gripped it in your hand, stroking it languidly as you admired his impressive size. It was everything, and yet nothing like you expected it to be, most definitely making the area in between your thighs all tingly and anxious.

That would have to wait, though. Right now, this was about pleasing him.

Precum had begun to bead at the tip, leaking out and sliding down his member ever so slightly. It had made you wonder, just for a moment, how long it’d been since he had been with someone.

“Can I suck your cock, Frank?” you asked him in that one voice that you usually used right before doing some very questionable and shameful activities, and he just groaned slightly.

“You can do whatever you want, sweetheart,” he said as he ran a hand through his hair.

“Really?” you asked as you continued to stroke him, only now tightening your grip just a tad as you began to rub onto his balls, now, causing a moan of frustration to fall upon your ears.

“Damn right,” he said, and you chuckled to yourself amusedly as you swiped up the next droplet of precum from the head with your tongue, ever so lightly tasting the unique tang that was him.

He made a sound that was similar to a sigh as you swirled your tongue around his head, feeling the stiffness of his cock that was caused by you, in your mouth. You felt his hands go into your hair, his fingers wrapping up inside of your locks gently as you took him in deeper into your mouth. You hollowed your cheeks out as you sucked onto his cock, your tongue going over a particular vein on his member that seemed to have quite the effect on him, as his grip on your hair only grew tighter and stronger.

“Fuck,” he hissed as you brought your mouth down his member, only to come back up. Your hands were quick to stroke onto the parts of his cock that you couldn’t reach with your mouth, moving up and down his shaft while your warm mouth accepted him wholeheartedly. “Oh Christ, you’re so good.”

You chuckled again, causing reverberations to rumble through his shaft, earning another very satisfying moan from him. You began to pick up the pace as you felt that he was getting more and more needy, desperate for you to work your magic on him.

You obliged, bobbing your head up and down his shaft as best you could without jump starting your gag reflex. Your hands continued to stroke him while your tongue and mouth sucked him, bringing him closer and closer to the edge of oblivion.

“Oh, fuck,” he moaned as he had to physically push you away from his member. “Fuck, Y/N, I ain’t gonna last if you keep doin’ that.”

You giggled and he laughed along with you, bringing you in closer to him so that he could kiss you. Your mouth opened automatically against his, as though there were absolutely no inhibitions restraining you and absolutely no qualms or worries holding the both of you back from enjoying and exploring one another’s bodies.

He groped at your breast, again, while you panted into his mouth as he kissed you fiercely, displaying his dominance towards you. He pushed you down onto your back so that he was on top of you once more, dropping his kisses back down to your neck, biting and sucking onto your skin, all the while moving down to your inner thighs, where he nipped and sucked onto the skin that he found there.

“Fuck, Y/N,” he said as he admired the work he’d done on your body, “I gotta have you.”

You smirked as you spread your legs open a bit wider, “I’m not stopping you.”

He connected his lips to yours yet again as he drove into your center, swallowing up the moans that you emitted as soon as he did so.

His cock stretched you in a way that made you fucking delirious with lust and desire and yearning and longing – you needed him just as much as he needed you.

After he had given you a moment to adjust to his size, you had begun grinding down against his hips ever so lightly, earning a grunt from Frank.

“Need you to move,” you said as you wrapped your legs around his torso, bringing him in deeper inside of you. You cried out softly at how close the two of you were, before you felt him pull back, only to buck up inside of you again.

Frank gave you a few slow thrusts before he began to move faster, fucking into you hard and deep.

“Fuck!” you cried out as his cock continued to drive into you with a pace that only began to get more and more brutal. At some point, he had begun to pound into your pussy so hard, and at a speed so breakneck, that you found yourself unable to even make any sounds of moaning – your mouth only able to fall open in an 'o’.

Frank covered your mouth with his as he kissed you, the kiss representing everything else that was absolutely desperate about the scene. The kiss was one of hunger, and neediness, and desperation, and passion, and lust, and it seemed as though it captured every single emotion that you had felt towards Frank Castle in the time that you’ve known him.

And still, you needed more.

Your hips rose to meet his every thrust, enjoying the feeling of him completely ravishing your body. “Shit,” you moaned as you felt pressure against your clit. You knew, somewhere in the back of your mind, that Frank had begun to draw circles onto your clit, stimulating you in an attempt to get you to come undone before him.

Little did he know, that if he kept that up, you’d be giving in in seconds.

“Fuck, Frank,” you moaned, your voice turning to a needy whine. “Fuck, I need to cum. I have to cum, Frank, I have to cum!”

“Fucking hell,” you heard Frank grunt as you subconsciously tightened around him, so close and on the verge of cumming that you could barely contain yourself. “Fuck, baby girl.”

Your breath was coming out choppy, now, as you felt the coil in your lower belly tighten inside of you, that warmth begging to be released. “God, Frank, Frank, I need ta cum! I need to, I need it, Frank, please, Frank, please.”

“Shit!” Frank groaned as he rubbed onto your clit one more time, and then. And then. And then.

You both fell.

“Fraaaank!” you screeched while he called out your name. Your inner walls clenched tightly around him as he spilled inside of you, both of your orgasms hitting you at the same time like a hurricane. Frank held tightly onto your skin while the both of you tried to slowly regain some type of normalcy in behavior, the endorphins still running rampant in your minds.

He let out a small moan as he slid out of you, removing the connection that the both of you had had and making you feel extremely empty at feeling the loss of him inside of you.

His body went down next to yours, pulling you in to him closely as he shut his eyes. You couldn’t help but just look at him, one question swirling about in your mind. “What?” he asked you, not even opening his eyes. It perplexed you as to how he knew that you were staring at him, in the first place.

“What does…?” you began, feeling your high slowly ebb away as you are brought back down to Earth. “What does this…make us?”

Frank chuckled lightly as he opened his eyes, pressing a kiss onto your forehead, your nose, your cheeks, and then, finally, onto your lips. “What do you think?”

“I don’t…know? Kinda why I’m asking you?” you giggled with a small smile on your face. Your heart was actually thundering in your chest as you thought about what this could be. If could be a wham, bam, thank you ma'am kind of thing, or, it could be what you secretly wanted, but wouldn’t admit to. Not yet. Not if he didn’t want it, too.

His strong arms hugged you just a bit tighter as he said, “I ain’t lettin’ you go, Y/N. You got that?”

And it was those two simple sentences that seemed to still your pounding heart.

When you practically stumbled home early the next morning after your rendezvous with Frank, who else were you to discover but Matt there, along with Karen, who was tying his tie.

“Y/N?” Matt asked as soon as he noticed your presence.

Busted. You had been hoping to sneak into your room before you caught anyone’s attention and just pass out on your bed, but that apparently wasn’t happening.

“Uh, yeah?” you asked him as Karen finished up tying his tie, now directing her gaze at you.

“Oh my–” Karen gaped upon seeing you. She covered her mouth as she laughed to herself, causing heat to flush through your face. Just how bad did you look?

“Where were you?” Matt asked you, “I was worried.”

“Ummmm…” You pondered over what to say, deciding to choose the lesser of all evils. “I had a date.”

Not the truth, but not far enough from the truth that he would be able to detect your white lie.

“I’m guessing it went very well,” Karen continued to snicker.

You had to get attention off of you, and fast. “Uh, hey, are you guys going to the funeral?”

Karen looked at Matt, who didn’t say anything at all. “Yeah, actually.”

“Cool! I’ll, uh, I’ll come with,” you said, already striding to your room. “I’ll just be a moment!”

Once you closed the door and were by yourself, you immediately looked at your reflection in the mirror.

Shit.

Hickies were everywhere; scattered all over your neck and chest. Upon the removal of your clothing, you found that there were even more hickies to be found on your inner thighs and across your stomach.

He had basically made you a canvas for his failed Pollock-esque painting.

No wonder Karen was being so strange!

You felt like smacking yourself. Of course that was why she was looking at you like that. You were lucky that Matt wasn’t able to see you. You just knew that if he was, he’d throw an absolute fit and demand to know who had done it, and this time, you wouldn’t be able to say some white lie. He would know if you were lying, and he’d probably go completely ballistic at that.

It would be worse, though, if he knew the truth.

You quickly picked out a black dress from your closet and slipped into it, fixing your hair immediately after so that it could be at least partly presentable. Once you’d done that, you busted out your makeup kit, fixing yourself up so that the bags disappeared from underneath your eyes and the visible hickies disappeared from your neck and chest.

“Y/N,” you heard Karen knock on your door. “Are you ready?”

“Almost!” you called to her as you tossed on a necklace over your head and slipped into a pair of flats, figuring that there was no point in almost killing yourself by wearing heels.

Once you finished, you opened the door, almost running right in to Matt.

“Woah!” you exclaimed as Matt cracked a smile at your flustered behavior. “What’re you smilin’ at, Matty?”

“Nothing,” he commented as Karen laughed behind him. “Did you have a nice night last night?”

Karen.

You looked at the blonde haired woman and gave her a weak look. “Oh come on!” You said as she continued to laugh. “D'you have to tell him!?”

“Alright, alright, let’s go,” Matt said as you grumbled behind him.

This was going to be a very long service.

When you got to the church, Father Lantom gave his eulogy. For the most part, you agreed with him: Grotto wasn’t a good man; hell, he wasn’t even a decent man. He may’ve been deeply flawed, like Father Lantom had said, but that didn’t mean that he had to do the things that he did. If he was truly looking for redemption like Father Lantom said he was, then why hadn’t he gone in the right direction before? Why would he wait until the majority of the Irish were out of the picture to start wanting redemption?

It didn’t matter, though. Grotto was dead, and there was nothing that could be done about it. No matter what you thought about him, or what Matt though about him, or what Frank thought about him – he was dead. Father Lantom’s words wouldn’t bring him back, and neither would Matt’s regrets as Daredevil.

It was incontrovertible.

Matt stayed behind to talk to Father Lantom while you, Foggy and Karen went back to the office. In all honesty, you’d rather be with Frank than spending time in their office, but your opinion quickly changed as you discovered what Karen was doing.

“Whatcha got there, Karen?” you asked as she pulled out some files from her desk.

“These are the Punisher files I got from the ADA,” she said, and that immediately piqued your interest.

“Punisher files?” you asked her and she nodded.

“Uh, yeah,” Karen said, “It’s everything that the District Attorney has on him.”

“Why does the DA have files on the murderous vigilante of Hell’s Kitchen?” you questioned and she looked up at you.

“That’s exactly what I was wondering!” Karen said as Matt walked into the room. “This is all of the stuff that the DA’s collecting for her case. And most of it’s about the Punisher’s victims.” She handed Foggy a photograph of a skull with a gunshot wound in the top of his head. “The Dogs of Hell, the cartel…But this was in the middle of it. Not someone he shot, him.”

She was referring to the photograph, obviously, and you peered over Foggy’s shoulder to take a look at it.

“He’s insane,” Foggy attempted to come up with a reason. “Maybe he shot himself.”

The protective side of you flared up, although you kept it quiet. There was no point in throwing in your two cents when they were already making up their own minds.

“I thought about that, but at that close of a range…” Karen began.

“Yeah, he’d be dead already,” Matt said.

“Okay, not to go all tin-foil hat here, but Tower obviously slipped this to me for a reason,” Karen said. She looked at all of you, “What if the Punisher isn’t the worst of it? What if Reyes is trying to cover something up?”

“Cover something up?” You asked curiously.

“You think that the murderous psychopath isn’t the worst of it?” Foggy asked, and you heaved a sigh.

“No,” Karen said. “And, I think our best shot at protecting Nelson and Murdock is to find him.”

Just then, the phone rang, and Foggy went to go get it; but not before saying that, “It’s our best chance at career suicide. Or just getting shot.”

Karen sighed and turned to Matt, asking, “Am I insane?”

Matt, however, was completely out of it, his mind miles away. He had on that face that you knew was where he was thinking about the Punisher. About Frank.

You didn’t know how to feel about it.

“Nothing, just…Father Lantom’s eulogy really got to me, I guess,” Karen said, her voice morose.

Matt gave a light chuckle and he said, “Yeah, he does that.”

“Mmm. Punisher’s a lunatic,” the blonde haired woman said.

“But you care anyway?” Matt asked her, probably out of curiosity.

“I wouldn’t say that,” Karen said. “It’s more like…curious.” She took a seat next to where Matt was leaning and said, “In between these files and…and Reyes’ obsession, and the fact that humans are a pretty complicated species to begin with, I just…I feel like there’s gotta be more to the story.”

There was. There was, but you couldn’t tell them. They couldn’t even know that you knew something, anything at all about Frank Castle.

Otherwise everything would be ruined.

You could tell that Karen and Matt were about to have another “awkward crush” moment, so you interjected, before they could continue their conversation, “Hey, guys, I’m gonna go and…be…anywhere but here.”

“Do you, uh, have to work today?” Matt asked you and your eyes widened.

“Crap!”

You’d nearly gotten to work late, for the first time in your entire career at the Library. When your shift finally did end, it was at the end of the day and you were already shit tired, half expecting Frank to show up around the area, waiting for you as he had been doing for the past while.

He wasn’t.

Maybe that should’ve been the first sign. Maybe that should’ve rang some bells in your head, but, see, you just weren’t thinking about it.

Why weren’t you thinking about it?

When you got home, you practically collapsed onto your bed, promising yourself that you’d go to sleep for ten hours, at least.

But you found that you couldn’t sleep. Sleep just wouldn’t come, no matter how many times you wished it.

You rolled over in your bed, and found yourself turning on the small TV that you had placed in your room. At first, you were just channel surfing, considering turning on Netflix and watching some random show or movie that was in your list that you still had yet to watch, but you instead landed on the news.

Just in time to hear the most surprising news of your life.

“Frank Castle, the gunman wanted in association with the shooting at Metro-General and the suspect of several other gangland related killings, was apprehended tonight at St Michaels cemetery,” the news broadcaster said, and you felt something inside of you fall.

“No,” you said initially, “No.” That couldn’t be true, could it? You had barely gotten together just a day ago. He was fine when you had him drop you off a block away from the apartment. He’d kissed you, then, and told you that he’d see you soon.

He promised that he’d see you soon.

And now, what? Now, suddenly, he was apprehended? Outside of a cemetery?

There had to be a reason behind this, an explanation, something. Something.

Someone.

Matt.

That couldn’t be, though, could it? How had Matt found him? How was he able to locate him and turn him over to the police without causing a riot? How had Frank gone down? Where was Matt? Was Matt okay? Was Frank okay? Were you okay?

The answer to the latter, of course, was no. No, you were not okay. You were not okay at all.

You shut the television off, partly angry, and mainly disgruntled at everything. At Matt, at Frank, at yourself.

You knew that it wasn’t Matt’s fault. He was just doing what he thought to be right. He was just trying to stop the bloodshed in Hell’s Kitchen. All he wanted to do was make his city a better place. That was all. It wasn’t his fault.

It wasn’t Frank’s fault, either. He believed in what he did, and so did you. All he was doing was avenging his family’s vicious murders, and, in the process, took down countless of other people who were causing problems in the city. He had strong conviction in both himself and what he did. He never wavered. He never doubted. He never hesitated. He was making, as he called it, the “hard call”. He was doing what he believed was right, and he knew that some day someone would catch up to him. You’d known it, too, deep down. Matt wouldn’t give up. He wouldn’t let Frank walk. You knew that Matt would eventually catch him, you just didn’t think that it’d be so damn soon.

When it came to the question as to who’s fault it was, you knew who’s fault it was: your own. You had chosen to fall for Frank. You had chosen to give your all to Public Enemy #1. You had chosen to be with him behind your brother’s back. You had chosen this path, this road to take, and now you had to walk down it. You had chosen to work with Frank behind Matt’s back. In a way, you’d chosen Frank over Matt. You had chosen your lover over your brother. You’d caused all of your own problems. You’d made your bed, and now you had to lie in it.

But you didn’t want to. You didn’t want that fate. You didn’t want this for yourself, or for Frank. If they knew what he’d done – all of the things that he’d done, in a court of law, what would happen to him? Would he be put away for life? Probably. Would you never see him again? If that’s what happened.

You found yourself sinking down into the covers, wrapping yourself up into the blankets, and feeling the irritant piercing of tears brimming your eyelids.

You didn’t want that. You didn’t want that at all.

The next days blended into a mix of work, eat, sleep. Work, eat, sleep. You knew that that wasn’t good for you, and you should’ve been doing something more helpful for Matt (you knew the he was going out and doing things as Daredevil), but you just couldn’t bring yourself to do anything.

It was, admittedly, pathetic. It’s not even like you should’ve cared that much about him, but that was the pathetic part: you did. You cared so much that it didn’t even make any sense. Maybe it was sympathy turned feelings; maybe it was because you felt like he didn’t deserve all of this pain that he kept getting hit with time and time again.

And be didn’t. He didn’t deserve that. He deserved something good, not…not whatever you imagined would happen to him as a result of the actions he did because of his pain and suffering.

It just wasn’t fair.

Matt didn’t know why you were acting the way you did. It worried him, mainly, and he thought that there was something wrong with your moral compass regarding your vigilante life.

“It’s nothing, Matty,” you told him, knowing damn well that you couldn’t tell him why you were feeling so blue. There wasn’t any reason to.

And then, the trial started.

“We’re going to be representing Frank Castle in the case,” Matt told you one day while you slinked around the apartment, still in your pajamas. Today was your day off, and you were spending it where you were just chilling by yourself.

That, apparently, wasn’t happening.

“You can–uh,” Matt said, “Would you like to come?”

“What?” you asked him, “Why?”

“Well, I figure that you would want to see how this plays out,” your brother said, “Considering all of the things he’s done.”

You bit the inside of your cheek and said, “I’m good. Kinda wanted to just spend my day off in here.”

Matt looked slightly dismayed at your rejection, and he said, “Alright.”

“But, hey, you do good, alright?” You told him, “Go and represent for Nelson and Murdock. Get some new clients. Shove a tree up Reyes’ ass.” Matt chuckled slightly and you knocked him in the arm gently. “Seriously. Go out and do what you do best.”

When the time came for the trial to actually come on television, you found that you didn’t want to see the trial.  You didn’t want to have to put yourself through that kind of thing, that kind of pain. You had an idea as to what was going to happen, and you didn’t think that putting yourself through watching your brother defend your lover while believing that he was guilty would help you any.

And so, you spent your time walking outside of your apartment, down to the park, and around the little pond that you once visited with Matt and Jack when you were younger.

You dropped pebbles and rocks into the pond, watching the ripples tremor the water. You began to compare your life to that pond; one small act, or in this case, a pebble, created countless of repercussions throughout the water. Jack took you into his family. That was the first pebble. You and Matt grew together. That was the second pebble. Matt left for college. That was the third. Stick trained you. Fourth. Matt came back for you. Fifth. You tried to pretend that you were normal; that you lived a life of a regular librarian. Sixth. Matt became Daredevil. The seventh pebble. You joined him on his crusade. The eighth. The two of you took down Wilson Fisk. Ninth. Nelson and Murdock prospered. Tenth. The Punisher bloodied the streets with his form of justice. Eleventh. You and Frank first met on the rooftop of that building. Twelfth.  You began to fight alongside Frank. Thirteenth pebble, gone down into the waters. You fell for him. Fourteenth. And now, here you were.

The fifteenth pebble remained clutched in your hand, tightly in your grip. You considered letting it drop, letting it fall and create ripples into the pond that would affect it forever. But if you did that, then that meant that the next event was set. That meant that things were incontrovertible, and that Frank’s future was set.

You didn’t want it to be true. Not yet.

And so, you let the pebble fall from your hand back into the grass, hiding itself in among the blades.

Time could still be rewritten. It could still change. You’d just have to wait for it.

The next day, when Matt was out doing god knows what, Karen knocked on your door.

“Matty’s not here right now,” you immediately told her.

“Oh! But I wasn’t actually looking for Matt,” Karen said to you, “I’m actually…looking for you.”

“Me?” you asked her and pointed to yourself. Karen nodded.

“Okay. Um.” You opened the door wider, “Come in…?”

Karen took you up on your offer and stepped inside of the apartment, walking with you to the main room.

“So…what is it?” you asked her as you both sat down onto the couches across from one another.

Admittedly, she could’ve been wanting to talk to you about a number of things. Her relationship with Matt, about the case, about an outfit she wanted to buy.

What she did ask you, though, was the farthest thing you could’ve ever guessed that she would ask of you.

“Frank Castle,” she said slowly. “He…he wanted to know…” Her face contorted into that of slightly confusion and perplexity. “He wanted to know how you were doing?”

You felt your chest tighten as you let out an exhale. “Oh,” was all you could utter. Mentally, you wanted to smack yourself for coming up with the lamest reply in the history of replies.

“That’s…that’s it?” Karen asked you, and you shrugged. “How–How does he even know you? Let alone wonder how you are while he’s so close to being put away for life?”

“It’s just–” you began, but found that you had absolutely no explanation. There was nothing to say. Nothing that you could say, anyway. Nothing that would make any sense.

What could you say? 'Oh, yeah, Karen, I met Frank on a rooftop where he tied me and Matt to a chimney. You know, your boyfriend, Matt Murdock? Yeah, him. Anyway, we were there while Frank shot Grotto dead. And then, Matt knocked out Frank, but not before Frank blew up the Dogs of Hell’s bikes, so we had to knock out all of them just so we could get out relatively unscathed. And then, Frank visited me at my job and I ended up helping him kill some more people. I started to have these stupid ass feelings for him so we had sex at this underground gym of his, where he basically told me that we were some type of a 'thing’, but the next day he was taken in to the police by my brother, who harbors very strong feelings of negativity towards him. Oh, yeah! Did I mention that Matt’s the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen and I’m supposed to be his Midnight Mistress? And Matt’s supposed to be defending Frank Castle, the person that he turned over to the police? Well, yeah.’

You knew that that just wasn’t going to fly. Not only would Karen blow an absolute fuse, but that would most likely ruin her and Matt’s budding relationship.

“It’s…” You began, “We met at the library.”

“The library?” Karen asked, and you nodded.

“I used to read to his kids. Back when they were alive,” you said. “He came by one day, I didn’t know it was him. He asked about them, so I told him. That’s it.”

And now here you were, lying to Karen, now. How many people did you have to lie to?

“The kids loved me, so he just wanted to see who I was,” you continued. “He left after that, and I never saw him again.”

Lie, lie, lie.

“Huh,” Karen said. She seemed as though she were thinking, and then she nodded, laughing slightly to herself. “Right. Right, I don’t know what I was thinking. I was just…”

“You were just…?” You asked. “Just what? What’d you think?”

She looked at you and then chuckled. “I…don’t know. Whatever I thought was happening is…so far from the truth, that I don’t even know where I go it from.”

“No, wait, Karen,” you said, “What’d you think?”

“That the two of you were together?” She asked, more like a question.

“Really.”

“I know,” she said, “I know.”

“Me?” You asked, pointing at yourself. “With Frank Castle?”

She shrugged and laughed. “It’s just the way that he mentioned you, it was with this kind of…fondness, I guess is the word? Like the two of you had some type of history. I don’t know.”

“Wow, Karen,” you said. “That’s some…uh…interesting observations.”

She had hit the nail on the head.

The trial continued, and you continued to avoid it like the plague.

When it ended, though, you knew it.

It was like something inside of you could just feel the completion of something. Emptiness. Like something was crumbling from deep within – you couldn’t quite describe it.

Matt had told you of the verdict on your way to work as he donned his Daredevil suit.

“Do you wanna…come with?” He had asked you.

You had shaken your head, knowing that he’d have Elektra as company and backup. He didn’t need you, not really. He just wanted to give you the chance, the opportunity to go into the fray with him as you used to.

“No, thanks, Matty,” you said as you closed your bedroom door behind you. “Thanks for asking, though.”

And that was it. You continued on with life – a mediocre, vigilante-less life, mind you – going to the library, reading to the kids, heating up frozen pizza in the oven or eating some Chinese takeout from that one little restaurant on the corner street. In your spare time you kept mainly to yourself, engaging in hobbies that had been pushed to the back burner after you became a vigilante. You listened to music and found solace in the artists that you loved.

You found yourself living like a normal woman your age, for once in all of your years.

But that all came to an end when Frank escaped.

It was so dumb. You had decided that you shouldn’t worry about him anymore. That he was a chapter of your life that would never be finished, a chapter that would never find it’s end. You’d written him off, started to move on.

But the very damn second that he showed up in your life after it all, that chapter popped back open as became the very most important thing that mattered to you.

It was after his “death”. After the group of hostages were taken on top of the building, and after Elektra’s untimely demise. It was after Frank had helped Matt finish off the ninjas of the Hand, and after everything had ended.

You’d been walking to work. It was a nice day out; the sun was shining but it wasn’t scalding hot – it was more temperate, if anything. Fluffy cumulus clouds floated across the blue sky in puffs and wisps of white, decorating the sky with it’s simplicity.

By now, you’d convinced yourself: you didn’t care. You didn’t care. You were over him. He was the one who threw in the towel; the one who gave it all up. He could’ve tried harder to try and fix it. He could’ve tried. For himself. Not for you, you didn’t really matter. He could only fight for himself. If he wanted to be saved, he would have to try, first.

He hadn’t even done that, though. He had just given it all up, as though nothing in his future mattered. As though he himself didn’t matter.

And so, you left it. You could do nothing to help him, nothing to help yourself.

So, you had to bury it.

Of course, that was your entire intention. That was what you had planned on doing. That was what you were supposed to be doing.

It all went to shit the moment you felt a hand on your waist pull you into an alley.

It took two seconds for you to wrench out of the person’s grasp and press your forearm against their throat.

“Who the–” you had started, but stopped as you noticed his jawline. His height. Those lips. The eyes.

You let him go and backed away slowly, squinting your eyes at him.

He was wearing a hat, and that hat covered a majority of his face from you, but you knew it. You fucking knew it.

“Y/N–” he started, but you stopped him.

“No,” you shook your head. “No.”

“What?” He asked, cocking his head.

“No.” You had said it flatly, intending on walking out of the alley and leaving him behind in your past for good, but your heart was telling you otherwise.

“Wait, wait, wait, Y/N,” he said, catching your arm. “What is– what are you saying?”

“You left,” you hissed at him. “You left, Frank. You blew the trial, and you got put away, and you left.” You shook your head, “Do you even understand how that made me feel? Like you just throw in the towel, give up whatever we had, or whatever we could’ve had, and come back? What did you expect me to do, Frank? Jump into your arms? Pretend like none of that ever happened? Because it did. It did, Frank, and now you have to deal with the repercussions.”

“What, you think I wanted that?” Frank asked you, “You think I wanted to blow the trial? You think I wanted to lose you?”

Your heart fluttered as you said, “You obviously wanted something.”

He bit his lip and said, “I was put up to it, okay? That whole…the entire system, yeah? It’s shit. It’s corrupt. It’s broken and evil and I did what I had to do to survive so that I could come back to you.”

“That doesn’t even make any sense,” you muttered.

“Course it does, Y/N! You just have to understand, this, alright? From the way I see it,” he said. “Sentence could’ve been worse.”

“It could’ve been better if you’d just cooperated with Nelson and Murdock!” You told him, “And now that your trial dragged them through the mud, their firm is over. It’s ruined, and they’re nothing now. So how’s that for you, Frank? How’s that? Is that any better for you?”

“Y/N, listen to me, alright?” Frank said, taking hold of your shoulders. “Hasn’t been a day that’s gone by that I haven’t thought of you.”

You scoffed, “And I’m supposed to just believe that?”

He have you the most serious look that you’ve ever seen appear ok his face and he said, “Damn straight.”

Your heart and mind clashed in what to do. On one hand, you wanted to forgive him. It seriously wasn’t his fault; he couldn’t do anything about his circumstances. On the other hand, you wanted to close your heart off from the pain, turn away and never come back.

It was pretty obvious which one ruled out.

“So, what?” You finally asked him. “What are we supposed to do from here?”

“Move forward,” he told you, “If…you’ll have me, that is.”

You sucked in a breath and nodded. “But, I have to tell you, I am a bit rusty. Haven’t been taking to the streets as much lately.”

“Yeah?” he asked you, “And why’s that?”

You shrugged. “Maybe it’s 'cause the only partner I’ve ever had that really understood my fighting values went away.”

“Yeah?” He asked you and pulled you in ever so closer to him.

“Yeah.” And then the both of your lips just seemed to connect on their own; easily, without any hesitations on either of your guy’s part. It was natural, soft, gentle. It was a kiss of reassurance. A kiss of unspoken feelings. A kiss of – dare you believe it? – something more than feelings.

It was definitely more than a kiss.

Somehow, the two of you ended up voyaging to your apartment. You found yourself playing hooky instead of going to work, like you were supposed to. Matt was gone, and he wouldn’t be back until well off into the evening.

It was so strange; the way the two of you fell back into one another, like nothing at all had changed. You explored one another’s bodies hungrily, swallowing up moans and kisses and begs and pleads. You pleasured one another in the most carnal way that there was–and yet, it was the sweetest thing in the world.

He had held you tightly in your arms as he rutted into you against the wall, whispering sweet nothings into your ear as you came completely undone before him. You traced and scratched and clawed marks into his back so that you could at least grip onto something as he found his release inside of you. He dropped you down from your place on the wall onto the bed, crawling over beside you as he took you in his arms and pressed kisses all against your neck and lips and cheeks in a languid manner that caused something to stir inside of you. You felt filled with some type of contentness, as though just being with him made you feel complete all over again.

The two of you fell asleep next to one another, with his arm thrown over your torso and your back pressed against his chest. For the first time in a long time, you felt safe. You felt happy. You felt loved by someone who wasn’t your brother.

And that was very strange indeed.

You stirred from the depths of sleep at a time when the sky had darkened over. That meant that evening had come. Which meant that–

“Frank?” You asked him as you turned around, unraveling yourself from his grip. “Frank.”

“Mhm…?” he groaned, and that almost made you stop worrying about what was going to happen at evening.

But no, you weren’t stupid.

“Frank, you have to go,” you told him as you clambered out of the bed, pulling on your clothes that had been flung into different directions.

“Jesus,” he groaned as he rubbed his eyes, “You’re not having second thoughts about this, are you?”

“Oh, hell no,” you told him as you pulled on some sweats. “It’s just that my brother’s coming home, and he’s not exactly too fond of…” You looked back at him and his eyes widened.

“Me?” He asked, and muttered underneath his breath, “Who isn’t?”

“Hey, now,” you told him as you walked up to him, taking his face in your hands. “I happen to be extremely fond of you, alright? It’s just my brother, he…”

“I get it, sweetheart,” Frank said as he stood upright. “I do.” He quickly gathered together his articles of clothing and got back into them in no time at all.

“Thank you,” you said and he leaned down, pressing a kiss to your lips just as your bedroom door swung open.

Your attention was immediately diverted to who had opened the door, and you saw that your worst fears had suddenly come true.

“Matty!” you exclaimed, immediately flying into defense mode. “I can explain!”

You noticed that your brother’s jaw clenched tightly, and then he said quietly, “There’s nothing to explain.” He closed the door behind him almost precisely as quickly as he’d opened it, leaving you alone with Frank.

“Shit,” you muttered, rubbing your temples with your fingertips. “I’ll see you later, Frank, okay?” you asked him and pecked a kiss onto his cheek.

“Right,” Frank said, as he was stunned, as well. He hadn’t known that the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen was none other than your brother.

“Matty, wait!” you called after him as you exited your room quickly to burst into his. You found him seated on his bed, cane still in hand, just staring at nothing. “Matty, please, just hear me out.” He didn’t say anything, he didn’t even raise his head up to acknowledge you. “Please, Matty.”

“What do you want me to say, Y/N?” Matt asked you, giving you a pause.

“I want you to understand, Matty,” you said quietly. “I want you to understand…all of it.”

He chuckled cynically and said, “I know the birds and the bees, Y/N. I’ve known a lot longer than you have, anyway.”

“Matty.” He wasn’t cooperating with you, and he clearly wasn’t even listening to you. But you had to get though to him, you just had to. You had to make him understand. You had to help him see just how happy Frank had made you.

“What can you say, anyway? What is there to be explained about my sister sleeping with a serial killer?” Matt asked you.

You scoffed, “That serial killer saved your life on more than one occasion.” You weren’t afraid to remind him of that fact.

“And killed countless others in the process,” Matt replied, shooting your words down.

“He’s more than what the public sees, Matty,” you tried to reason with him. It was true; Frank was so complex and difficult and yet so passionate and loving that people always seemed to miss out on that. Your brother was the worst of them all to convince – he literally thought that Frank was the embodiment of a crazed lunatic.

“Oh, of course, because he’s such a great guy, now, isn’t he?”

“He’s always been a great guy!” Your voice raised up higher, now. “He’s always been a stand up guy! He’s just gone through a ton of shit, his family was murdered right in front of him, and he himself was shot in the head.”

“That doesn’t excuse him from his actions, Y/N,” Matt said. “You know that, and I know that.”

“Matty, we’re vigilantes! We do the same thing that he does, it’s just that he–,” you defended Frank, “He’s just taking it a step further. That doesn’t mean that he’s wrong.”

“Are you…are you even listening to yourself?” Matt asked you, his face showing his obvious discontentment. “What we do is nothing like what he does.”

“He saved your ass when Elektra was murdered,” you spat out, dealing all of your cards at once. “If he wasn’t there to kill those bad guys, then they would’ve killed you. They would’ve killed you, and I would’ve lost my brother. Is that what you would’ve preferred? To let me be alone?” He went quiet, so you continued, “Matt, you said it yourself before. Maybe his way is the right way. Maybe we could do things his way, because it works.”

“That–that was just a one time thing,” Matt replied.

“That’s bullshit, and you know it,” you told him. “You don’t get to say one circumstance is where killing is needed and all other circumstances like that aren’t. What about the next time a Wilson Fisk comes around the corner? Or maybe even when Fisk gets out himself? You just gonna put him away again? Let him work his ways and corrupt the system even more? Or are you going to do something about it, Matt? Are you going to let Frank do it? Or me?”

“No,” he shook his head. “Not you. Never you.”

“Matty–”

“He can kill,” Matt seemed as though he struggled to get the next words out. “He can kill all he wants. I forbid you from taking a life.”

“Matty-”

“No,” he said flatly. “If…say, if…you love him, and…and he–he loves you. You can be with him, but you just can’t kill like him. I don’t want that for you, Y/N. I don’t want…”

“Matty,” you said softly as you sat next to him on his bed, wrapping your arms around him. You placed your head onto his shoulder and sighed, breathing in the smell of his suit.

“I promised dad, Y/N,” he said, his voice breaking. “I promised that I would always take care of you. That I’d be there for you.”

“I know you did, Matty,” you hummed as you patted his back. “I know you did.”

“And I can’t…I’ve lost so many things, Y/N. So many people,” he said, and you felt a droplet of warm liquid fall onto your arm. “Foggy, Karen, Elektra, Nelson and Murdock, Claire – and I,” he sucked in a breath of air. “I can’t lose you. Not when you’re the only person to have always been there for me. I can’t lose my sister, Y/N, because you’re…you’re all that I have left, and…”

“It’s okay, Matty,” you hugged him tightly. “You’re not gonna lose me, no matter what. I’ll always be here for you. You’re my brother, I can’t exactly get rid of you.”

Matt let out a breathless chuckle and you squeezed him just a bit tighter.

“Just because…just because I’m…with Frank, that doesn’t mean that I won’t be here for you,” you told him. “It’s not like I’ll be choosing between the two most important men in my life, anyway.”

Matt seemed to be content with your reassurances and slumped in your arms, giving you the opportunity for him to lay in your arms while he fell asleep.

Roles had been reversed. It was the two of you, as it had always been, and as it will always be.

Y/N and Matthew. Matthew and Y/N.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! please leave a kudos or a comment if you enjoyed!


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